Of schemes and dreams and pretty things
by Marveilla Xi
Summary: When Draco Malfoy makes a wish, it is always granted. Except for when he never thought it could be. And when a certain Goblin King is involved, things are never what they seem. When boundaries blur and worlds collide, who is the victim and who is the one to have the last laugh?
1. Chapter 1

Notes:

This story has been brewing in the cauldron for a long time, and now it's finally coming to life, excruciating chapter by excruciating chapter. So far 4 chapters are complete, and I will be posting them as soon as they are ready. After that, I do not know how often I would post, I will do my best. The characters have already escaped my attempts at a pre-determined plot and are running rampant through the storyline, so who knows...

This fic is my answer to the deplorable lack of HP/Labyrinth crossfics in fandom, and the pairing and plot was so obvious I was amazed it hasn't been realised yet (or maybe it is, and I have not found it?). Be that as it may, my major focus is character development and not original settings. In fact my purpose was to take much loved and time-approved situations, place those characters in them and see what happens.

Lastly, I'd like to dedicate this work to the remorseless H/D slash queens of old, Rhysenn and Cinnamon, who got me into this [mess] a very long time ago.

Enjoy and please do not forget to make my day and review! This work is in progress, so suggestions and constructive criticism will be duly noted and very much appreciated!

Chapter 1

Utter boredom has a way of wrapping its tentacles around you when you're not looking, and then it simply refuses to let go, for days at an end. At least that was what one Draco Malfoy was experiencing, in these gloomy weeks that barely dragged themselves in an early November Hogwarts. Classes have started and settled, the novelty of being back at Hogwarts for his final year and even the bossing around of everyone younger than him, which was his right as a last-year (and in Draco's mind, has been his right since he first set foot in Hogwarts, but somehow others have refused to acknowledge it) had quickly exhausted its charms, turning into a habit instead as he tried to cope with day-to-day school life.

It was not that schoolwork was anything less than demanding. Draco glided through Advanced Potions and 7th year Transfiguration in the way he pretty much glided through life – with the air of "it hardly deserves my time, but I'm feeling generous". He excelled in his studies with the easy shrug of someone who just cannot be bothered with such measly excuses for time-fillers.

Maybe that is why he ended up in the library on that gray late afternoon – not researching anything in particular, but letting the drowsy library air wash over him. He liked the library – as opposed to the rest of the castle, it didn't have the air that Something Very Important is Happening; the library wore its own boringness as a badge of pride, because after all, libraries are supposed to be utterly boring. And they drive people in their depths for other reasons entirely – out of sheer necessity, gloating at their victims' inability to leave until they have finished their work and enveloping them in warm waves of nothing-ever-happens. Hogwarts' library was no exception.

So, on a whim in that late November afternoon, Draco took his boredom along in the library, just for the sake of finding it some company. Maybe it would leave him alone for a change.

Had he just known that something was already in motion. Had he bothered to look at the big grandfather's clock at the far end above Madam Pince the librarian's head, he would not have been the least bit surprised to notice that the clock-face had suddenly (or not so suddenly) acquired an extra number – the number "13" squeezed awkwardly together with number "12", but unmistakably there all the same.

I say he would have been bored to notice. This was Hogwarts, and things like that happened all the time.

But he would have been wrong to be bored. He should have been very much intrigued, indeed.

* * *

Harry Potter was one of those obnoxious persons who bashed in Hogwarts' air of Something Very Important is Happening Here as if he's been born into it. In fact, he took to his daily tasks with a vigor and energy that would give every self-respecting Slytherin a headache that would not go away with so much as a simple Headache Potion. A true Gryffindor he was, through and through.

Harry Potter never took a day for granted. A lifelong of "something always happens to me, and little of it is good" had taught him to accept every day as a gift, in the best tradition of inspirational quotes everywhere, even where gloomy early-November afternoons were concerned.

So when Harry took his leave of an approving Hermione and a grumbling Ron at his announcement that he still needed to do some research on his Herbology essay on the seven uses of Mandrake, Harry entered the library with a bounce in his step that few students associated with the prospect of spending several hours in its gloomy abodes.

"Ron, the fact that you prefer to wait until your homework is overdue in order to even start thinking about it does not make it evident that others should be doing the same!"

Hermione's exasperated voice reached his ears from the far end of the corridor. What Ron grumbled in response he did not hear, but he had a number of pretty good guesses, each of which would do nicely.

Harry smiled to himself. These two have been arguing like an old married couple since first year. It was only a matter of time until they made it official, out of habit if not for anything else.

With a contented sigh, Harry chose a secluded table at the far end of the reading section and placed his choice of books around him, seemingly unaware of a shock of silver-blond hair across the hall, where a certain somebody was looking at some very unlikely shelves.

* * *

"FAERY LORE"

Draco stared at the fancy golden inscription above his head. He did not have the first idea how he had wondered off in this section of the library, where almost nobody ever went.

In no way related to their studies, except the occasional "Mythical creatures" reference and the deluded first-year schoolgirl with her head in the clouds and still enamored with faery tales, the FAERY LORE section was mostly left to itself.

Pale lights illuminated shelves upon shelves of, in Draco's opinion, the most useless collection of books that Hogwarts' library possessed.

"It must have been a donation by some "Save the faeries!" idiot organization or another", Draco thought wryly.

Those were getting popular lately, aided by "The Quibbler" which never refused to print yet another ludicrous story of how faeries not only existed, but were in grave danger of [insert here].

Still, as he had no particular purpose, and plenty of time on his hands, he strolled along the shelves in lazy strides.

Some of the inscriptions grazing the books' covers made him raise him eyebrows ("Good faeries, bad faeries – and how to tell", by Milliburn Mawley), whereas others made him snort outright, which in turn raised eyebrows followed by a disapproving sniff by an all-hearing Madam Pince. ("The naked moon-dance and its implications for the faery ring: a study", by Celena Celestine).

Draco absent-mindedly brushed his fingertips over the covers of books further down the dark shelves, relishing the feel of old leather and books so rarely taken out that they seemed to have blended into each other, seemingly glued together. His fingers went over "The Lia Fail and its whereabouts", by Balthazar Vince, and then took an unexpected plunge instead of continuing on to "Mystical to mundane: how to charm Leprechauns into doing your housework", by Belinda Moore.

Draco looked down at where his fingers seemed to have missed a book, and for a second it seemed to him that the space in-between was empty – until his eyes caught a glimpse of faded red leather further inside the shelf.

He reached in, and took hold of a book that was so small next to the others one could easily miss it entirely. A little bugger than the size of his palm, the small book bore a single inscription in bold, black lettering on the cover, in elongated gothic script that was nothing if not elegant –

**"****Labyrinth".**

Draco frowned at the plain cover. There was no author in sight, and the small book looked almost untouched, but somehow ancient at the same time. On impulse, he strolled over to a reading table neighboring the "Faery lore" section, took a seat and opened the book, and immediately rolled his eyes: the little book was in rhymes.

He almost abandoned it then, having been taught from a very early age that all poetry was utter foolish nonsense. ("Way to go, father, of course one cannot waste time with useless wordsmithing when one can be exploring the various ways of cursing somebody into oblivion", Draco mused, with the wry mirthless humor reserved where his father was concerned, ever since their falling out two years ago).

But there was something about the little book – maybe it was the feel of its parchment-like pages, and the pleasing rustling sound they made as they turned, or the fact that the initial gothic script was preserved throughout the book, in dark red ink to match the leather cover – but he did not let go of it, even if it was guilty of containing rhymed verses.

Instead, he absent-mindedly flipped through the pages, letting the soothing murmur of students' muffled talk wash over him as his boredom was laid momentarily to the side, forgotten for once.

The little book's plot was rather thin, but what it lacked in content it almost made up for in elegance of rhyme. Draco could not help admire it. Before he knew it the verses drew him in, to a point where he neither noticed nor payed attention to his immediate surrounding anymore.

The story was a classic faery tale, but with a certain malicious twist, which made it worthwhile for Draco: the figure of the Goblin King.

It was basically the story of this Goblin King who apparently occupied his eternal life by taking mortals from the muggle world who have been wished away to him.

In this particular case it was a young girl, an utterly boring and foolish creature as far as Draco was concerned, who in a moment of anger wished her baby brother away for the goblins to take.

Draco rolled his eyes at the way the stupid girl shouted her request and was promptly astonished when it got granted, and then tried to back off.

If anything, that was what magic is constructed around, and anyone who've ever taken first-year Charms was aware of it: Magic drew its power from the intent in the conjurer's words, and it acted accordingly, both taking a life of its own and bending to the caster's wishes, but not all the way, and never entirely.

Draco chuckled at the way this Goblin King figure reacted to the foolish girl's statement of "not meaning it": he couldn't have dismissed her better himself, and he had the training of a lifetime of dismissing people to rival the most ruthless of Goblin Kings.

If Draco had stopped reading and given it a thought, he would have realized that the reason he carried on reading, putting up with the girl's foolishness along the way, ("Merlin's beard, she's annoying!", he mused), was the strange enthrallment he felt with the character of the Goblin King.

Even rhymes could not tatter the man's alluring description – tall and lithe of frame, with a shock of silver-blond hair cascading down his shoulders and sticking in all directions to enframe a pale angular face exuding an otherworldly glow, impossibly high cheekbones leading to a pair of mismatched eyes, one blue and the other green, that stared down coldly and with detached amusement at the girl's inadequate pleas.

Draco silently applauded his choice of dress, the elegant simplicity of it – a white poet's shirt, with slightly ruffled edges, and a pair of black breeches leading to a pair of plain black leather boots, his hands covered by black leather gloves.

Certainly a mouth-watering image worth saving for later on, preferably when he was alone in his bed in the Slytherin dorm with curtains drawn around his bed, and a silencing charm cast around it for good measure.

Draco's enthrallment with the evilly handsome amongst males was secret to no one, ever since he came out last year. There was only one attempt at ridicule directed at him in recorded Hogwarts' history, and the story was still told in whispers behind hands in dark corridors, being debatable whether the joker carried his ears and nose in a small bag after the confrontation or found himself reliving his worst nightmares every day after lunch for a month. Either way, Draco was left to it. Too bad that in all of Hogwarts there was not one prime example of evil handsomeness to aspire to.

Now, examples of utterly annoying Gryffindor goody-goody handsomeness, on the other hand, were quite present on an everyday basis.

Harry Potter, with his unruly jet-black hair which was no longer sticking out in all directions as its owner wore it a bit longer these days, still topped a face of pale skin and sparkling emerald-green eyes, complimented by a body frame that was not lithe but slender, having grown much in height over the summer, broad of shoulders and of chest, made for a mighty pleasing sight.

Too bad Draco only needed to look twice to find himself with thoughts of manslaughter on his mind, preferably in slow, painful ways. Too bad, indeed, that he couldn't stop himself from looking all the same.

* * *

"Through dangers untold and hardships unnumbered…"

Draco rolled his eyes again. Honey, if these measly excuses for obstacles I just read about can be called that, then you have no idea about anything at all, he mused.

Anyone with a wand would have found these a child's play to deal with. Draco with a wand would have actually enjoyed cursing minor creatures in a variety of creative ways. Too bad he had no pesky little brothers to wish away, he chuckled.

"You have no power over me."

Draco slowly closed the back cover of the little book and pensively placed his chin in the crook of his joined hands. He was surprised to notice that it was much later than he'd thought. Darkness had crept up on him as if dripping off the far corners of book-filled corridors and from amongst the shelves themselves, somehow bringing along an unsettling feeling that had nothing to do with gloomy everyday library darkness. The library was almost deserted now, and it was quiet, or as they say in cheap suspense thrillers, too quiet.

None of this registered with Draco however, who was still wrapped up in the after-effect of the story he'd just read and was staring absently into space. In this precise moment a shock of jet-black hair caught his attention, and brought him up short.

* * *

"That's just fantastic", Harry mused, annoyed. He'd just finished the research he needed for his Herbology essay (he hadn't known that a potion of Mandrake roots had quite THAT effect on some male parts. He'd have to put this knowledge aside for further investigation, which probably cannot be conducted in the Hogwarts' library and would most certainly need to be kept secret from Hermione), when he realized two things.

One, that it was already later than he'd thought and he'd probably missed dinner, and two, the only person seemingly left in the library besides himself was one Draco Malfoy, sitting at a lone table to his far left side.

He realized he'd need to walk right by him if he wanted to leave, which would almost certainly lead to bickering and an exchange of insults which were second nature to the blond Slytherin when it came to the subject of Harry, and of which said Harry was getting exceedingly tired.

More of an acquired habit than out of real malice, at least since last year when Draco Malfoy supplied priceless information to Dumbledore which ultimately helped them to overcome Voldemort and his Death eaters once and for all, one of them Draco's own father, Draco nevertheless had stuck to his attitude towards Gryffindors in general and Harry in particular, flipping insults his way whenever he had half the chance.

Harry, on his part, did his best not to let the blond get the better of him, but the old malice was not really there, and for him, it was a show he kept up because frankly, he had no idea how to act around Draco otherwise. He certainly did not strike one as likeable, that was for sure.

So Harry gritted his teeth, gathered his belongings and stood up, bracing himself for the inevitable confrontation that was to follow. If he'd had any idea what was to come, though, bracing himself wouldn't have been nearly enough.

* * *

A devilish grin had spread unto Draco's features as he contemplated Harry's image at the far end to his right.

"Now there is someone I'd gladly wish away in half an instant, and to certainly worse creatures that a kinkily-clad Goblin king, at that," he thought.

Still chuckling under his breath, he flipped through the early pages of the little red book until he came upon the part where the girl wished her baby brother away.

"Let's see how it goes…" He mumbled as he read fast-forward to the words that needed to be said. Then, he theatrically and with much mock-exaggeration raised one hand in front of him, his face displayed mock-seriousness and for his own personal entertainment, Draco employed an elaborately formal voice to say,

"Harry Potter, I wish that the Goblin King would come and take you away, this instant!"

The library went completely black.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Harry found himself in complete and utter blackness, and for one incredible instant the thought that there had been a power cut crossed his mind. But of course, this was Hogwarts, so this could not be it. His blood ran cold. Then something struck him in the back of the head and sent him into oblivion.

* * *

Draco gripped the edges of the reading table before him so tight that his knuckles went chalk-white. Of course, it was too dark to notice.

He wouldn't have dreamt in a million years that this was caused by the words he'd uttered mere seconds ago, in wild mockery of the story he'd just read. But that would have made him as ignorant as the girl he'd just had such a grand time making fun of.

And Draco certainly did know a thing or two about the consequences of speaking words at the whim of a moment's fancy. He just could not even begin to imagine that this might be real, which just came to show how much he still had to learn.

Unfortunately, his time had just run out.

A man stood before him, a man he recognized from a description in a faery tale, a man whose appearance would have served him well in the purpose of spending some pleasant twenty minutes before going to sleep that very night.

A man who was nothing if not menacing. A man who regarded him with cold eyes full of ridicule.

"Hello, my pet."

Still gripping the reading table, Draco stared wildly at the creature before him. It seemed as though the entire library had shrunk around him to clear up space for the ethereal being that was casting a soft otherworldly glow around himself without any possibility to notice where exactly the light was coming from. It was as if a capsule was formed around the pair, as their surroundings fell away and left nothing for Draco to hide behind.

Not that he would. Hide. If given half the chance. No way.

"Well?" Irritation was plain in the man's voice. "I believe a request of YOURS just summoned me from, I must say, much more pleasant activities than this here business."

Draco realized that he was gaping at the man like a fish out of water, opening his mouth and then closing it mutely.

The issue was that really, there was nothing he COULD say. Yes, it was obvious that his moment of folly had started this, and it was just as obvious that saying something in the lines of, "But I didn't mean it!" would be the lamest line in the book, and not only it won't benefit him one bit, but from the increasingly irritated look the man was giving him it was only going to make matters worse.

He needed to speak. He needed to get himself out of this. Now.

"Umm…" was Draco's ingenious first attempt at proving he still belonged to the human species.

He cleared his throat and tried again, as a very distant wheel in his brain clicked into place and turned, and set Draco on the only path he was familiar with when surprised – scorn and sarcasm.

He was self-confident enough to believe that he might win this. To say that he was badly mistaken would be the biggest understatement in history. To say that he was lost was almost a certainty. To say that he was about to be eaten alive was highly likely, given the predatory look the man in front of him was giving him.

"Let's get this straight", Draco began. "I have enough knowledge of the way magic works to know that I happened to speak the words that brought you here without meaning them, but that this matters little. Be that as it may, I am prepared to strike a bargain with you, so that we both get to spend as little of our time as possible on this mess and be on our separate ways soon."

The expression of the man darkened.

"I am not certain that you fully understand the situation you've put yourself into, voluntarily or otherwise. Either way, it matters little to me. The moment you spoke The Words, you set in motion a story that cannot be undone. It has to be told. We both need to honor that, regardless how we feel about the matter. And believe me, my chagrin highly surpasses your own, my pet."

"So does this mean that things should unfold as they did in that book I just read?" Draco couldn't keep the annoyance mixed with disbelief out of his voice.

The Goblin King chuckled softly.

"Well, it depends. This was only one turn things can take. There is the small matter of choice. You humans pride yourselves with the notions of free will, I have noticed. What would YOU choose, my pet?"

The last words left his mouth in a low drawl, and he let a small, seductive smile creep softly on the left side of his mouth, which had Draco stare harder than he'd intended and speak hastier than was wise.

"A choice? As if there is such a thing! It was all a set up from the start, and if you think I am falling for…"

He trailed off, as he just now seemed to realize that the man was no longer standing idly in front of him, arms crossed in front of his chest.

The Goblin King seemed to be toying with his long-fingered hands covered in black leather gloves, but upon closer inspection Draco came to realize that he was swirling a crystal around in elegant, fluid motions, balancing it impossibly on the tips of his gloved fingers. The Goblin King noticed his gaze staring at the crystal, and cleared his throat his throat sharply. Draco's eyes snapped back to attention, and gave him an inquisitive look.

The Goblin King remained silent. Draco rolled his eyes.

"Spill it out then, as you so obviously want to. Far be it for me to ruin your little power trip," he drawled.

"Tsk tsk. So cocky", came the Goblin King's amused response. He inclined his head to the side and gave Draco a sarcastic look. "You would have to be taught manners before these 13 hours are over, my pet."

"Oh please," Draco gave him an exasperated look. "This coming from someone who makes a living stealing crying babies. Spare me."

The Goblin King pretended not to have heard him.

"This is what it looks like. A crystal, if you must know. But if you look at it this way, it will show you your dreams." He balanced the crystal on the tip of a finger and held it there for an impossible moment that stretched far too long to be real.

Draco raised his eyebrows.

"This I must see."

He leaned in, and peered into the sparkling sphere. It seemed to swirl and then stop, and Draco saw images forming in its depths, as if coming from a long way inside the sphere but becoming clearer by the second.

He saw himself standing in the middle of a brightly lit hall that looked suspiciously like Hogwarts' Great Hall, dressed in Slytherin-green dress-robes, holding the House cup up over his head amid wild cheers. A little way away he could see Harry Potter, sitting at Gryffindor's table with his head in his hands, hung down in desperation. Defeated.

The image changed before he could blink, and there he was, looking down at a Harry fallen on his back and himself pointing his wand at him. The Draco in the sphere had a triumphant look in his eye… and was it Draco's imagination, or was there a look of mischief in there too?

The image once more went blurry and then cleared in an instant, and Draco was not surprised to see Harry in it again. But this time he also recognized the surroundings instantly – it was Malfoy Manor, and not any place, but the dungeons.

The Manor boasted dungeons that seemed to be made to define creepy, dating all the way back to the 14th century, and this "dream" seemed to be set in one of the murkiest parts available.

Draco saw himself standing in front of a rusty cell-door, peering through the bars. Inside, on a bare stone floor laid a body, clad only with a pair of trousers that might have had a color once, but it was impossible to tell anymore. Soft whimpers were coming from the broken human mass.

Draco leaned in further and spoke softly, "Does this mean that you have had enough?"

The crystal went smoky once more, and even though Draco stared at it for a few more seconds, nothing appeared.

"Oh dear. It seems that your wildest dreams involve the most possible harm coming to the exact object you've just wished away to me. That rather renders your previous question useless, don't you think?"

Draco looked up at the Goblin King, who was still toying with the crystal in his hands, although the motion now had an air of practiced ease that did not mean to impress, but was rather an acquired habit.

"The choice I need to make." Draco stated blandly.

The man before him nodded his head slowly, as one glove-clad hand balanced the crystal on the tip of a long finger and then abruptly, the crystal was gone.

"So say if I choose to have my dreams… what will be in the small script?" Draco folded his arms in front of his chest, as if in an involuntary gesture of self-protection.

"I beg your pardon?" The Goblin King raised an inquisitive silver brow.

Draco rolled his eyes. "What will this mean for me? What is my part of the deal?"

The malicious grin was back in place, as quick as thought.

"Obviously, I get to keep the one wished away. Seeing the things you would like to do to him, it would be my fair guess that what I might intend to do to him would be of little interest to you." He leaned in. "And you will have your 13 hours of… dreams." He purred.

Draco contemplated this. Throwing insults at Potter in school corridors was one thing.

But wishing him away for all eternity… was way too good to be true.

A slow smile crept up one side of Draco's mouth and twisted his features into a malicious grin that, given a few dozen centuries to mature, might be ready to rival that of the Goblin King.

"You've got yourself a deal."

* * *

"Ron, Harry certainly took a while in the library, didn't he?" Hermione raised her head from the book she was reading in front of the fireplace in the cozy surroundings of Gryffindor's common room.

Ron was sitting at a small table on the side of the fireplace, completely engulfed in a game of Magical chess he was rather unseamingly losing to a grinning Seamus Finnigan.

"He has Quidditch practice tonight, hasn't he?" He offered distractedly over his shoulder.

"Oh." Hermione picked up her book. "That's right."

* * *

The Goblin king was lounging in a rather luxurious-looking sofa covered with red velvet tapestry, his long legs propped up on a small table in front of him which accidentally also sported a tall glass of honey-colored liquid, glowing faintly in the light.

He had a rather pleased look on his face, a pleased look that in his books consisted of a slight malicious smirk barely touching the corners of his lips.

This encounter went remarkably well, he mused. Given the nature of his trade, he was rather used to begging, crying and pitiful words from the stupid mortals he usually had to deal with.

But this boy, with his slender figure and silvery hair, with a malicious nature that rang well with the Goblin king's own, was like a breath of fresh air.

Too bad the boy was way too self-confident to go into details of the deal he'd just struck. Too bad he jumped at the offer like he did. This left an awful lot to the king's imagination regarding the nature of unfolding events to come, and he was certainly not known for his benign sense of humor, nor for his forgiving nature.

The Goblin king snickered at that thought, and then absent-mindedly raised a gloved hand, conjured yet another crystal out of thin air and looked into its depths, amused.

He saw the silver-haired boy, Draco Malfoy, striding through what looked like a dark hallway in a dungeon. He silently watched as he stopped in front of a rusty cell-door and peered inside, where a human mass lay splayed onto the floor, uttering small, almost imperceptible whimpers.

Draco leaned in, and whispered, "Does this mean that you have had enough?"

The crystal blurred for the fraction of a second, and then gave off a rather different light, pale and iridescent, before returning to the same image under the scrutinizing gaze of the Goblin king.

"Yes", came the muffled reply from the body lying on the floor. "Please, I'll do whatever you want…"

The image blurred and then cleared once more, and this time displayed a softly lit room, dominated by a massive four-poster bed.

Draco Malfoy's pale form lay sprawled across the bed, and leaning over him was the boy he'd wished away, trailing a string of fleeting kisses over Draco's neck and down his chest/. Draco's head snapped back, and a deep moan escaped his throat.

The Goblin king made the crystal disappear with a snap of his fingers. His grin was gloriously malevolent.

"Well, being selective of exactly **which** ones of your dreams I get to show you is, after all, my choice to make. I do hope you're alright with that, my pet."


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

If Harry had a handful of galeons for every time events in his life took a sinister twist, dragging him along for the ride without even informing him of what's going on, he sure would have added a significant fortune to his vault at Gringotts.

This awakening was rather peaceful though, at least as far as they went. His surroundings slowly swam into focus, and he found himself lying on a bed that, from the feeling of it, was certainly not his own four-poster at Gryffindor's dorm, but was not uncomfortable either. Still in-between sleep and consciousness, he studied his surroundings with weary eyes.

It was a small, but cosy room, set in a dungeon probably because there were no windows to be seen on any of the walls. Pale torches illuminated the room, set in rough stone walls that confirmed his first suspicion of being in a dungeon. An ancient chest of drawers could be seen on his immediate left, and in front the room boasted a large fireplace and a small table in front of it. On two sides of the table were two high armchairs, with their backs on where he was laying.

Harry shuffled in the sheets and slowly sat down in the bed, but had to clutch his head with his hands as vertigo kicked in. The room spun, and he had to remain seated for a few instants until the feeling subsided.

As a result, he missed a presence in the room that he sensed mere moments after the feeling of nausea subsided, and he stared in disbelief as one of the armchairs slowly turned to face him.

In the armchair was sprawled a man, who had his legs perched on the low table in front of the fireplace. He took his legs off the table so he could spin the armchair around and face Harry, as he pensively propped his elbows on his knees, bent forward to rest his chin on his joined hands, and regarded him with a piercing, calm stare that revealed nothing at all.

The man's calmness spurred Harry to action. He stood up, his right hand went to the pocket of his jeans, where he found his wand at its usual place and gave silent thanks for that. He gripped his wand tightly a took a step forward.

"Who are you? Where am I, and what the fuck am I doing here?!", were the very uninspired questions that spilt from his lips, but they needed immediate answering nonetheless.

The man lifted his head slightly (a head that was, Harry noticed, surrounded by cascading silver-blond hair, so light it looked almost white in the pale light of the torches), and spoke in measured tones.

"My name is Jareth, I am King of the goblins, and you are in my castle", he stated simply.

Harry opened and closed his mouth a few times in mute astonishment until he finally blurted out the most unhelpful observation of,

"But you don't look like a goblin!"

The man's mouth curled slightly upwards.

"Well spotted. I am of the fae folk, if you must know. The story of how I came to be king of the goblins is a rather tedious one, for which I trust you care little, right now."

Harry shook his head as if to clear his thoughts. Was it the warmth of the fire burning, or the distinct allure that the man himself exuded, but he felt slightly lightheaded.

"This is a dream, right." It wasn't even a question, more like a statement that could not possibly be mistaken. Or else.

"Wrong." The simple word spilled from the man's lips, but otherwise he kept observing Harry in silence.

It would have represented a startling contrast to him, had he cared at all about such things. As it was, the Goblin king had seen far too many twists and turns of fate in the millennia he had ruled supreme in the Underground. Victims and casters and evil-doers were nothing new to him, and could not move him. But even so, the irony was not lost on him – the irony of once again fulfilling the wishes of the wicked by spiting the decent folk. At least the boy in front of him seemed to be decent – his wide green eyes were staring at him in earnest, trying to understand what had happened to him and why, refraining judgment as much as he could until he had all the facts. Almost as if he believed that the good guys always win in the end. Jareth knew better.

Harry stood straighter, gripped his wand tighter and pointed it at Jareth.

"I'll ask you one more time. What am I doing here?"

The Goblin king smiled at the obvious threat, and dismissed it with a wave of a gloved hand.

"Spare me your threats. I assure you that your pitiful magic has no power here - of course, you are welcome to try. All the more time you'd lose before you get to your explanation. Or should I maybe cuff you to the side of the bed so we can have a reasonable conversation? In which case I must inform you I'll gladly oblige."

The easy way in which the Goblin king's mind jumped to cuffing and beds in casual conversation should have perhaps bothered Harry a little. As it was, he was too busy not believing his own eyes to notice.

Harry took a deep breath. He steeled himself and gave the man an inquiring look, and remained silent.

"That's better," Jareth drawled. "Now. How about you see for yourself?"

At this a crystal appeared in one hand, and he brought it forward, so that Harry could peer into it.

Harry took a cautious step forward, never once letting go of his wand, regardless of what the man had said earlier.

The crystal started glowing with sparkly, ethereal light, and of all places showed an astonished Harry the Hogwarts library, where a certain Draco Malfoy sat reading a small book with a dark red leather cover bearing a single inscription in bold, elegant letters across it...

"Labyrinth"

_"Draco Malfoy wished me away to you?!" _

Harry's voice rose to a near shout as he stared incredulously at the crystal, which slowly went smoky and then turned translucent again.

The Goblin king nodded his head slowly, his eyes never once leaving Harry's face. His expression betrayed nothing.

"I cannot believe this." Harry sat back on the bed with a thud, past caring about whether this position left him more exposed to the man sitting before him.

His head was spinning. For his credit though, we must say he never once doubted the story he just saw in the depths of the crystal sphere.

For one thing, the man before him looked anything but someone to be dismissed – he didn't look like someone who would waste his precious time on the likes of Harry, either. Somehow the man – or fae, Harry mind chipped in unhelpfully – commanded respect and left little place for doubt.

That said, Harry found it hard to wrap his mind around the new he'd just been served, albeit in such an elegant way. The fact that Draco freakin' Malfoy read some obscure faery book was one thing, and really none of his business. The way he'd thought it would be such a grand joke to pretend – wish Harry away was just the thing someone as Malfoy would do.

But the outcome of this wish was completely mind-blowing, and apparently Harry did not have any say at all as to what happened to him. It was as though he'd suddenly turned into some sort of pocket change that can change hands as quick as that, without it having any say in the matter. And Harry suddenly gasped at the absurdity and chilling logic of the situation he'd found himself into.

He raised his head and looked the Goblin king in the eye. The fae was still lounging in the armchair, looking at him with cryptic, and, Harry noticed distractedly, mismatched eyes.

"Before you start ranting how none of this is fair and how nobody asked you to be a part of this, let me make some things clear."

The fae let his hands fall on his knees and straightened up in the armchair.

"Strictly speaking, were are all three bound by a unique magical contract, whether we like it or not, and the magic will have its due, of that I can assure you. It always does. In this sense, you acquaintance Draco Malfoy is the caster of the spell; I am the medium that makes it happen, being bound by a magical contract none of you two can even begin to comprehend, being human and all that." Jareth gave a sardonic smile and Harry pursed his lips, but remained silent.

"And as for you, you happen to be at the receiving end of the spell, or to put it melodramatically, the victim. To Draco Malfoy falls the burden of consequence, for he has triggered powerful magical forces, of which, may I add, he understands little, if anything at all."

"I hold the power of fulfillment, and I can twists and bemnd circumstances to suit me, although I cannot break certain rules put forward by the same magical contract that binds me to this task."

He stopped for effect.

"You, on the other hand, seem to have the least say in it all – but can, and certainly will – influence the decisions your caster makes, whereas your judgment is unclouded by having your wildest dreams fulfilled, but is rather sharpened by the mere instinct for survival."

"Why are you telling me all this?" Harry cut in. His brow was furrowed, as if he was making the greatest effort of continuing to think logically, one thought at a time, and pushing the knowledge of what was happening at the edges of his consciousness, otherwise he might snap and run screaming. This would certainly come later.

"It's not like you care what happens to me."

The Goblin king's lips curled up in a knowing smile.

"Ah, but you see – I find myself in a win-win situation. Either way I get my prize."

"What do you mean, either way?"

"Should Draco Malfoy lose himself in his own dreams, he cannot hope to get out. And waking dreamers are mine for the taking."

"Meaning… I get to walk away?"

The Goblin king nodded slowly. A mischievous grin was playing on his lips, and Harry felt unsettled to the point of fidgeting slightly where he sat upon the bed.

Harry braced himself.

"So what does this mean, exactly – for him to lose himself in his dreams?"

"That won't be any fun if I told you, now, would it?" The Goblin king cocked his head to the side. "That is for you, my pet, to find out."

Harry opened his mouth to protest…

Quick as thought, the Goblin king snapped his fingers.

"Let the dreams begin."

Everything went black once more, and suddenly the Goblin king was alone in the room.

He retrieved the tall glass from the table and took a careful sip. The he chuckled to himself, and produced yet another crystal.

"Oh, what fools these mortals be!"


	4. Chapter 4

The feeling resembled floating underwater, in that eerie state one experiences on the verge between dreaming and waking up. These impossible moments that seem just that to a mortal – a moment, to be had for an instant, then lost forever to waking life. A stretch of time, stretched fine across the realm of dreams.

That was the realm where the Goblin king ruled supreme. And he possessed the power to stretch these moments to suit his needs and whims.

In this particular case, to the point of 13 hours. No more, no less.

Of all the places he could have found himself in, his own bed in the Slytherin dorm was one of the last Draco had expected right now. Somehow the word "dreams", especially as in, "your wildest dreams fulfilled", did not exactly commence in such mundane surroundings. They certainly should not be preceded by waking up in one's own bed, on a standard morning and without any "kaboom" whatsoever.

Then it struck him. It had all been but a dream. A dream, as in something your dormant brain conjures up at night.

Draco suddenly felt like kicking himself. But of course. This whole thing had been so utterly impossible in so many ways, he should have figured it out before.

The illusion had been nice while it lasted, though.

With a sigh, Draco pulled the covers off and got out of bed, heading for the bathroom. He stood in front of the sink and splashed handfuls of cool water on his face, and then he looked into the mirror.

He saw it that very instant. A long, delicate chain that hung around his neck, its end lost in his bed shirt. His suddenly shaking fingers reached into the collar of his shirt, to take out…

A watch. An intricately carved pocket watch, of the kind elderly gentlemen will make a point of taking out and examining, usually for the sake of displaying it rather than for a need to know the time. It was made out of a metal that looked like silver but felt much lighter in his hand. The dial displayed thirteen numbers, set in small crystals.

His hands gripped the edge of the sink for support. A part of his mind registered the thought that just instants ago he was feeling disappointed that the whole thing had been a dream, and now, as he held in his hand undisputable proof to the contrary, he almost wished none of this had ever happened. Another part of his mind was too busy simply screaming on and on, "This is real!"

But he wouldn't have been Draco Malfoy if he let something as minor as, oh, I don't know, getting your wildest dreams fulfilled throw him off balance. As he raised his head from observing the pocket watch hanging from his neck, the face that greeted him in the mirror was that of a grinning madman.

If Draco had ever been brought face to face with this major killjoy called consequence, he would have wiped this grin clear off his face and promptly been on his way to find a way of reversing this before it was too late.

Getting something for nothing had never ever backfired at him so far in his life; an important lesson had been lost on him, or, more accurately speaking, had never been pressed upon him at all.

If you imagine you'll get something without paying for it in every possible way, you are either a fool or someone who had yet to learn a lesson he'd never forget.

It seemed as though at the blink of an eye, Harry found himself in the Grand Hall of Hogwarts. One moment he was talking to the impossible creature who had so nonchalantly informed him he was not only a fae, but also a King of the goblins, and furthermore he was now an unwilling pawn in the fulfillment of Draco Malfoy's wildest dreams – information enough to send his flying to the lake, screaming at the top of his lungs. And now, seconds later, he was standing in the middle of the Great Hall, of all places.

Something was very definitely wrong though.

There were people in the hall. In fact, everything looked as it would on a feast, or another such occasion of utmost importance. All four house tables were full with their respective students, as was the High table. The only problem was, nobody was moving and no sound could be heard.

Harry, having spent a significant part of his life in muggle surroundings, was reminded of a movie put on hold. He was the only one who could move, so he slowly strolled down between the tables, looking at students' froze forms – some in mid-conversation, some in mid-laugh; others with a cup or a fork in one hand, almost reaching their open mouths.

He even caught a glimpse of Ron and Hermione, sitting together with the other Gryffindors at their table. Ron's hands were frozen in mid-air, as if explaining something that generally involved a lot of hand gestures – probably Quidditch – to Neville, who was sitting across from him on the table. Hermione had a book propped up before her and a disapproving glance at Ron frozen on her face, a piece of toast in her hand.

Then it dawned on him. It all looked like a set. A set, waiting for its principal characters to arrive.

"Precisely."

Harry almost jumped out of his skin as he heard a voice drawl the word behind him. He spun around to see the Goblin king leaning nonchalantly on a pillar, arms crossed in front of his chest.

He seemed to peel himself off the pillar, where he had so far rested among the shadows, becoming one with them so effortlessly Harry was quite sure he hadn't been there a moment ago. Or maybe he hadn't. Maybe Harry had had a bit too much to drink last night. Maybe the latest assault on his person had included spiking up his drink with some hallucinations-inducing thing or another.

Maybe he'd just wake up already…

"Stop it."

Harry felt a firm hand grasp his shoulder and started, as for the first time he got real-life, physical proof that this was indeed not a dream.

"What, can you read my thoughts now?" He asked, resigned.

The fae let out a low chuckle.

"Oh, I could, but I really don't need to, my pet. You do wear your heart on your sleeve, and I can read you like a book. You still hope to be awakening any time soon, is that correct?"

Harry merely shrugged. "I'm not sure anymore."

"Now we've indeed made some progress. Allow me to reassure you further." The Goblin King gestured upwards, and Harry tilted his head up to see something that definitely have not been there mere moments ago – an ornate clock, certainly wider and bigger than any he'd ever seen, suspended in mid-air a short distance above their heads.

As Harry was looking at it, the arrow moved slowly and without ever crossing paths with another one, for there was none, pointed towards the number "1". The clock struck, one lone, ringing sound, as lightly as silver bells and as ominous as a church bell, somehow both at once.

The clock boasted only one arrow, but what it also boasted were _thirteen_ hours, set in ornate, pointy, gothic-looking numbers.

At the exact moment the clock struck one, the doors of the Great Hall opened a fraction, to reveal someone stepping right in without hesitation.

Harry closed his eyes and took a steadying breath. He did not even need the confirmation of the glimpse of white-blond hair to know who it was that had just stepped in.

The living reason they were all gathered here, indeed.

Draco Malfoy.

Before the sound of the enormous clock striking one had faded away, several things happened at once.

Draco Malfoy took a step forward, but stopped dead in his tracks, as if he'd hit an invisible wall.

Harry opened his mouth to speak, but no sound came out.

The Goblin king raised a delicate gloved hand, balancing another crystal on the tips of his fingers, then slowly withdrew his hand, leaving the crystal suspended in mid-air.

The crystal gave a faint sparkle from within, which turned into a clear, blinding light, and then it began to expand. Before long it was already bigger than a house, and it expanded for a while longer only to pop suddenly, without any warning, just like a soap bubble, scattering faint glitter all around that disappeared before reaching the floor.

And, as old as this might be getting, everything went dark once again.


	5. Chapter 5

_The bright afternoon sun shone on a meadow of deepest green, spotted here and there by yellow patches of dandelions and white ones of daisies. On closer observation one might notice that it was not so much of a meadow but some sort of enormous, perfectly trimmed back yard, of the kind that only goes together with a mansion in the background. Ornate metal benches were scattered strategically near neat, pebbled alleys, backed by dark-green hedges._

_On one such bench sat a woman, legs delicately crossed at the ankles, in a gesture of propriety so deeply ingrained that she probably did not realize she was doing it. She was holding a book in her lap, a book she must have been reading moments ago since her index finger was put in-between the pages. Her white-blond hair shone with the sparkle of liquid silver under the sun. She was half turned around, and a radiant smile was blooming on her lips, making a slightly stern and haughty face of long nose and thin lips appear beautiful and benign. _

_She was looking over to where a man, around 30 years of age, was playing with a small boy of around 5. Both reflected the woman's hair, even whiter-blond with the boy, and slightly darker with the man._

_He was chasing the boy around the yard, emitting low, grumbling noises that suddenly ended in small eruptions of hippopotamus proportions, and every time the boy would scream with delight and double his efforts of escaping the man, but at the same time making sure he would be caught up with easily. Both were screeching with laughter, the noises causing the woman to shake her head with a smile, but she still did not return to the book in her hand. _

_Finally the man managed to grab hold of the boy's ankle with a courageous lunge forward. Both toppled over, collapsing in a heap of tangled limbs emitting muffled screams and laughter._

"_That's about enough, you two!" The woman cried out, albeit with a smile. "Now look at the state of your robes!"_

_Two heads of varying degrees of blond peeped up from the mess, two identical noses almost bumped as they exchanged a conspiratorial look. Then, they charged as one at the bench across the lane, sending the woman flying off it in indignant screeches._

"_Get her, Draco!" The man cried with a mischievous sparkle in his eyes._

Tiny droplets of sparkling bubble that had burst what seemed like a second ago were still floating to the ground. They landed and instantly disappeared, without ever leaving a wet circle in their wake as soap bubbles would. Rather, they left tiny specks of glitter that non-existing wind currents scattered before the eye could make them out.

But one could still feel the tinge of magic they left in their wake.

In their midst stood two boys. The blond-haired one, who had specks of glitter in his white-blond hair, stood frozen to the spot, his expression one of disbelief, combined with an exquisite softness and the beginnings of a smile that were rarely, if ever, seen on his sharp features.

The other boy stood gaping with his mouth open, like a fish out of water.

Then, he promptly ran his hand through his messy black hair and took a very decisive step forward.

"What the hell, Malfoy?! Are you really reminiscing about your happy childhood here?"

The other boy shook his head, once, twice, as if awaken from a trance. He blinked, and turned around wearing a blank look on his face.

"You saw it too?"

"Of course I did, you wretch, and don't you even get me started on how you, barking mad as you are, dragged me along for some sort of deranged hallucinational trip together with that man… fae… who keeps popping out of nowhere fingering those crystal things, I mean seriously, Malfoy, what the raging fuck were you even thinking…"

He trailed off as he registered the empty look he was getting for his efforts.

Then, he heard Draco mutter, so softly he could have missed it entirely if he had been another step away,

"This was not a memory. It never was."

Harry promptly shut his mouth and just stared at Draco, suddenly feeling extremely exhausted by this whole thing. How very typical. Of course the brat would never even acknowledge his actions, as if he was completely entitled to mess with other people's lives and wish them away to faery tale creatures at will. He simply had to direct all his energy towards getting out of this fix as soon as possible, and to hell with Draco Malfoy.

Harry sat heavily down on the nearest bench, which happened to belong to the Ravenclaw table, right next to a frozen Padma Patil holding a cup of pumpkin juice in her hand.

And the next thing he knew, the words Draco had spoken so softly did a back flip in his head and came to the front of his mind. "This was not a memory…", followed by, "his wildest dreams fulfilled", said in a low, drawling voice. Harry sat up straight.

So what he had just seen… witnessed… was an impossibility, something that represented the exact opposite of what reality had been.

This vision was brilliant in its happiness, radiant with love, a love so intense it made Harry's heart ache when he was once again reminded of what he had never had.

And it seemed neither had Draco.

The difference was that Harry had grown up without his parents, who, if they had been alive at the time, would have most probably behaved in a similar fashion with 5-year-old Harry.

Draco had had his parents there with him all his life, up until very recently. It came as a minor shock to Harry to suddenly realize that maybe not everything had been picture-perfect in Draco's family. Not that he had given it that much thought before, but when he had, he'd always pictured Draco Malfoy, the spoiled prince of Slytherin, as lacking nothing from his adoring parents.

For the first time Harry wondered whether all the glamour that was on the surface – the immaculate clothing, haughty manners, elaborate jewelry, a family name going back generations, power and influence – was not there to hide a tedious and rotten reality on the inside. One that Draco had had long years of perfecting to stay away from by giving away nothing short of perfection.

Harry looked up at Draco, who was still standing there, rooted to the spot and staring into space with this blank look and slight softness to his expression. And before he could think, his nature got the better of him; he felt a twinge of sympathy, and with it…

"Your parents never expressed their love for you as a kid, did they?"

This spun Draco around, as his eyes cleared and the blank, dreamy look left his eyes as quick as thought and was changed into one of blazing, cold anger.

"Fuck off, Potter! What do _you_ know about me, or my life, or my parents?!"

Harry almost physically jerked back, Draco's voice having shattered a delicate reality that was the aftermath of the dream they had both seen, reminding him once more that he was Harry Potter and this was Draco Malfoy and the best combination one could make of the two of them was to send one to the Slytherin dungeons and the other up to Gryffindor tower and hope they don't have a chance meeting in the corridors before the inevitable classes together come crashing in.

"Fine by me, you arrogant prick! Why don't you just keep off me and go live your imaginary life off somewhere while I figure out a way to get myself out of this mess that YOU got me into in the first place?"

Draco flared up and actually had the nerve to look hurt and indignant. Very mockingly so.

"Why, Potter! Do excuse my mistake. You see, you were supposed to somehow _disappear_ in exchange, and the fact that you're still around certainly does not fit into my idea of pleasant company."

"Is that so?" Harry had to clench his fists to retain some resemblance of calm. "Then why don't you pay more attention when you strike insane deals with imaginary creatures, you moron?"

"Any creature who'd offer me a sickle in exchange for your very existence is my new best friend, Potter!"

"This just proves all the more what an arrogant prick you are, always having others deal with your problems. This time you couldn't exactly call daddy now, could you?"

Even as the words left his mouth, a cool voice left in Harry's brain observed that a boundary had been crossed. And even though Draco, in the past, had not thought twice to bring Harry's dead parents up in order to spite him, Harry himself had never fallen so low.

Draco stopped dead in his verbal assault as all the blood left his face. He seemed almost translucent now, as if all the color that had until now illuminated his face had left it to pool in his eyes, turning them from pearly grey into two stormy dark pools of fury.

He launched himself at Harry without a word, and they both fell crashing to the floor with a thud, which turned out to be the back of Harry's head hitting the floor, hard.

Color burst in front of his eyes, explaining why he took the dial that had grotesquely sprung out of nowhere right on top of where they had fallen to be a hallucination.

That is, until the ornate clock he was faintly sure he was not seeing for the first time struck 2, in soft, ringing tones.

Harry just managed to turn his head a little to the left as he felt an all too-well aimed punch connect with his jaw. A moment before he lost conscience, he saw a glowing bubble-sphere floating his way.

A soft voice uttered, "Tick tock".


End file.
